Arthur Brendel, Beatty Memorial Lecturer 2011: world renowned pianist, poet and author ("Does Classical Music Have to be Entirely Serious?")

Beatty Lecture 2006: Richard Dawkins, "Queerer than We Suppose: The Strangeness of Science".

On this page, you will find the most comprehensive list available of past Beatty Lectures. Click on the title to watch the lecture or read coverage of the event, if available. Click here to visit the Beatty Lecture playlist on McGill's YouTube channel.

1980s

Kirk Varnedoe "Fine Disregard: Inventions in Early Modern Art - New Space: Near and Far / New Time: Fragmentation and Repetition / Overview: The Flight of the Mind" March 28, 29 and 30, 1988

Christopher Hill "Milton and the English Revolution / Bunyan and His World / The End of the World" November 26 and 27, 1987

John Mortimer "The Art of Advocacy / Clinging to the Wreckage" April 7 and 9, 1987

Francis Crick "How Do We See Things? / The Search-Light Hypothesis/The Problem of Awareness" May 13, 15 and 17, 1985

Lord William McCarthy "The Limits of Trade Union Power" September 19 and 21, 1984

I. F. Stone "The Trial of Socrates Revisited: What Plato Doesn't Tell Us: The Case for the Prosecution / How Easily Socrates Might Have Won Acquittal / Plato on Trial: The Hidden Horrors of a Perfect City" May 16, 18 and 20, 1983

Jane Goodall "Chimpanzees in the Wild: Perspectives on Primate Behaviour" May 9, 1979

E. O. Wilson "The Evolution of Social Behaviour" November 9 and 10, 1977

Edwin Reischauer "Japanese-American Relations" March 30, 1977

Derek de Solla Price "Craftsmanship and Jigsawpuzzling in Science" November 25, 1976

Alexander King "A New Economic Order - Is it Necessary or Feasible?" April 8, 1976

Yehudi Menuhin "Interpretation in Music and in Life" December 7, 1975

Fred Hoyle "The Emergence of Intelligence in the Universe/Cosmological Theories and Controversies/The History of Matter" March 20, 24 and 26, 1975

Robert N. Bellah "Relevance of Man's Religious Experience" March 1974

Saul Bellow "Joyce's Ulysses: A Personal View" November 7, 1973

Robert Sinsheimer "Genetic Engineering - Ambush or Opportunity" November 1972

Lord Peter Ritchie-Calder "Science and Social Change: Science and International Relations/Science and Human Rights/Science and Posterity" November 1971

1960s

Elizabeth Han Suyin "Asia Today - Two Outlooks" October 1968

Max Beloff "Commonwealth Weakness, Britain" February 1967

E. E. Rich "Montreal and the Fur Trade - The French Background/The American Frontier/The Northwest Company" March 1964

A. L. Rowse "The Political Uses of History / The Role of Germany in Modern History / The Responsibility of the Historian" January 1963

Douglas Copland "The Changing Structure of the Western Economy" November 1961

Arnold Toynbee "The Present Day Experiment in Western Civilization: The Experiment in Hellenization / The Attraction of the Western Way of Life / Parliamentary Democracy on Trial" January 12, 17 and 19, 1961

1950s

Morris Bishop "The Great River at the White Man's Coming / The Missionary and the Coureur du Bois: Sagard and Brandûlé / Champlain" March 3, 10 and 17, 1959

Julian Huxley "The Possibilities of Life, Mind, Man" October 25 and November 1 and 5, 1956